Telescope
by FerryBerry
Summary: In homage to many Friends episodes and Santana and Rachel's rendition of Every Breath You Take. S4. Kurt leaves Rachel with the present of a telescope for Christmas, unintentionally sparking a whole new competition between Santana and Rachel.


**Disclaimer:** I own nothing. All belongs to Glee writers and creators.

 **Telescope**

Kurt had gotten the telescope for Rachel as a Hanukkah present before he took off to spend the holidays with Burt, Carole, and Finn back in Lima. 'So the star can star-gaze,' he'd quipped, squeezing Rachel about the shoulders. Rachel was delighted and addicted all at once. She spent most evenings from there on in staring up at the skies with the chintzy astronomical guide that had come with it under her chin. Santana was duly unimpressed, and she thought using it at 11 in the morning was a bit too much.

"You know, it's day, right? The only star you're going to be seeing is the sun, and if you look at that too long, the only role you're going to land on Broadway is Blind Woman who keeps walking off the stage."

Rachel's response to this was to grin and promptly peek back into the telescope. "I know, I'm just people-watching. It's fun."

Santana poured herself a mug of coffee. "Creepy fun."

"It's not creepy unless they're naked, and nobody's naked down there. Except that man who's flashing people. Ew."

Santana snorted and plopped herself down at the table, and for some time there was silence between them, perforated only by the slurps and swallows from Santana.

"Oh - oh, my."

"If it bothers you that much, don't look at him."

"No - um."

Santana swiveled about. Rachel's cheeks had taken on a duskier shade.

"It's just. She's _pretty_."

Now _that_ was intriguing. Santana stood, mug in hand, and nudged at Rachel's shoulder.

"I'm the dyke, I'll be the judge of who's pretty."

Reluctantly, Rachel shuffled aside, and Santana squinted her eye up to peer through. The lens was directed at an apartment building that appeared to be a couple of blocks away and into a loft window. There, a brunette woman sat reading over her own steaming mug, already dressed in a sky blue sleeveless dress, but -

"You can't even see her face from here, how is she pretty?"

Rachel scoffed. "There are other things, Santana." Her voice took on that lilting, sodden quality that Santana loathed. "I mean, look at the way she sits. Her posture's perfect, but her legs are all - her knees together all prim and her feet spread out on the rungs, like…like there's still some innocence in her somewhere…"

Santana had stopped listening at 'legs.' "She does have some nice legs," she muttered.

It was true. Even from this distance, on this cruddy telescope, it was clear she was an athletic sort, with long, trim - but shapely - legs. Santana straightened.

"I bet she's a dancer."

Rachel considered that and took over the telescope again. "Oh - I'll bet you're right, I bet she's a ballerina, the way she points her toes."

"I said she had nice legs, not that she was anorexic."

"You are so offensive sometimes," she muttered, and Santana smirked.

"If I had to guess, I'd say hip hop. Or salsa," she teased, shaking her breasts with a laugh.

Rachel giggled, but shook her head. "No, she's too proper for hip hop."

"Now who's being offensive?"

"Besides, look - she's reading a textbook. I'll bet she's a student."

"So? She can be a dancer and a student."

"But I've never seen her at NYADA."

"How do you know, you haven't even seen her face."

"I think I would remember her."

"Well, she doesn't have to go to your precious NYADA to be a dancer, anyway."

Rachel practically bounced. "Okay, okay - what if she _is_ a dancer, but she does it to pay for NYU - no, Columbia!"

Santana narrowed her eyes. "Are you saying she's a stripper?"

"No! She probably - does music videos, or- or teaches little kids how to dance." She smiled, smitten.

"Who says she likes kids?"

"Just look at how neat she is, how she takes time to make sure her pages don't get wrinkled and the way she sips - definitely the maternal type."

"Or she just likes things neat." Santana grinned. "But I bet she's the wild type."

"No way."

"Come on, it's always the repressed ones you have to watch out for, and look at her. She's rigid as hell. Get a few beers in her and I bet your dancing law student becomes an _animal_." She bounced a little herself. "By the way, artistic _and_ smart? You can't have both."

Rachel promptly poked out her bottom lip. "Why not? They're not mutually exclusive."

"The hell they aren't. That's like saying someone is both sexy and cute."

"What if she is?"

Santana shook her head. "Not possible. Take you and me, for instance. Am I cute?"

Rachel snorted. "Certainly not."

"And are you sexy?"

"Cert - hey!"

"Exactly. And her, I lay my bets on sexy."

"Mm-mm, I say both." Off Santana's huff, Rachel added, "She's the exception! I mean, she's probably shy at first, or 'repressed,' as you put it, and it makes her…kind of precious because she's so trying to be confident while, underneath, she's a little afraid to be vulnerable. And you have to draw her out and gain her trust before she starts to open up and - "

"Okay, I'm getting bored, this sounds like all cute to me."

"I'm not done! And _then_ , she gets truly confident with you and she's this gorgeous, passionate goddess." Rachel seemed to shudder.

"Nah, too much work. I bet she wants you, she comes after you, and it's hot as fuck."

"I thought you said she was rigid."

"Sure, but that doesn't mean she doesn't get what she wants when she wants it."

"Wait, if I can't have it both ways, then neither can you. She can't be repressed _and_ a go-getter."

"Sure, she can, just depends on what she's repressed about."

Rachel frowned. "I don't follow."

"If she's repressed _emotionally_ , that doesn't mean she won't come fuck your brains out if she wants to. Just means she probably won't stick around for breakfast. Which is fine by me, I hate mornings."

"Well, she's obviously a morning person. She's already dressed and ready to go."

"Oh, so you think that's a point for you, do you?"

Rachel's cheeks darkened. "I never said anything of the sort. And it doesn't matter. Like either of us is actually going to go over there, anyway. We don't even know where she lives."

"Sure, we do, she's on the seventh floor, third apartment on the left."

She fumbled. "Well, there are buildings in the way, you could be off. Besides, we're _not_ going over there. Right?"

Santana smirked. "You scared to say hi to the pretty lady?"

"Aren't you? What would be your next line, anyway, 'Hi, we live a couple buildings away and we've been watching you through our telescope'?"

"Ooor, 'Hey, a friend of mine who lives in the building lost her cat, have you seen it, orange tabby, comes to the name Regina Phalange'?" She started toward the door.

"Well, hey! You know, I saw her first, so. If we're going to do this, then you should at least let me try first."

"Yeah, but I'm the lesbian here. The single lesbian. You have Brody _and_ Finn."

"Finn and I are not together, and Brody is…more of a casual thing. Besides, I could be bisexual."

"Better not let Kurt hear you say that."

"Look, how about we do it your way?"

"Me go first? Excellent."

Rachel promptly grabbed her arm. "No…I _meant_ , we tally up what we seem to have in common with her and whoever has the most at the end of, say, a week, goes first."

"Okay, that sounds fair. I'm a lesbian, I think that gets me fifty points ahead."

"We don't even know if she's a lesbian. Which is party of why this is insane, but at least I am willing to compromise."

"All right, all right. So, she's a morning person, she's neat, she's studying over Christmas break, so she must be a good student," Santana grumbled.

"That's three for me," Rachel grinned.

"Okay, don't get too far ahead of yourself now. If she turns out to actually be a dancer, that's one for me, plus - she's wearing a sleeveless dress and sandals in the middle of winter, which means the cold don't bother her, anyway, which is another for yours truly."

"That building could have central heating."

"Well, fine, we'll just have to watch and see if she goes out in that."

"Okay, fine. But it doesn't count if she's taking out garbage."

"Fair enough."

#

And so it was that Santana and Rachel wound up spending a week of their Christmas break watching a brunette goddess through a telescope. It felt, to Rachel, as creepy as it sounded, but Santana seemed determined, and Rachel could hardly let her win. What if her pretty woman actually was a lesbian, and Santana went over there and won her over and she was everything Rachel imagined her to be and she wound up sitting on the sidelines to their epic romance? Of course, it could turn out that she wasn't a lesbian or even bisexual, or that she was quite the opposite of Rachel's ideal, but…there was something about her that seemed worth fighting for.

It was a tense race, too. It turned out their gorgeous lady did like to dance, score for Santana, but she was using records to dance to, score for Rachel. And she did go out in just her sleeveless dress and sandals, for about a half hour, score for Santana, but when she came back, it was with tea and honey, score for Rachel. By dinner time, they discovered she could cook without burning anything and she ate meat, two points for Santana, and in the morning, the first thing she did was work out - Santana, of course, missed this, but Rachel was a fair competitor, and gave her the point when she woke up. It seemed the end of the road for both of them, but things tipped in Rachel's favor near the last day, when she not only sat reading an actual script, but practiced what appeared to be a musical number, judging by her movements.

She won.

"I don't think I can go over there."

"Winner defaults, it's my turn," Santana grinned, popping up from the couch.

"No, no! I can!" She faltered. "Will you go with me?"

Santana barked a laugh. "Seriously?"

Rachel nodded miserably. "What if she laughs at me? I mean, you said it yourself, I'm not sexy, I'm just this incredibly talented, cute…extremely annoying girl."

"Cute can get you pretty far, but you're right about the annoying thing."

After a quick stop in her bedroom area to get dressed while Rachel bundled up, the two of them trekked to the familiar pile of bricks and recounted from the street. Seventh floor, third apartment seemed correct after all, and so with a few pushes from Santana, they headed up. Santana, of course, wound up knocking, while Rachel stood, a bundle of nerves, rocking on her heels.

It turned out the nerves were entirely unnecessary. Quinn Fabray answered the door. Quinn Fabray with brown hair. Quinn Fabray looking quite surprised to see them. Santana started laughing. More like howling. Rachel stared.

"Um. Hi. What…are you doing here?" Her infamous eyebrow picked up at Santana, beyond Rachel.

"You moved to New York?" she found herself blurting, her brain entirely skipping over the worst of it for the moment.

"No," she chuckled, "I'm apartment sitting for a couple friends for the holiday."

"Oh." Rachel stared. Quinn Fabray. "You have…" She touched her own hair absently.

Quinn smiled. "It's for a production at Yale. I'm Velma, from Chicago?"

"Oh." Another silence fell, aside from Santana's giggling. "Well, we're gonna go now."

"No, we're not." Santana grabbed her arm in a surprising grip and pushed her toward the open doorway. "Or at least, you're not. I have so many people to call and see, but you - you need to bond with Velma!"

Quinn shuffled backward as Santana pushed Rachel forward. "Well, I - yeah, you're welcome to come in, both of you."

"Oh, no, just Rachel this time, Quinnie bear, like I said, _so_ many people to call. But have fun!"

The door slammed shut behind her. Rachel fidgeted.

"Is it just me, or is she getting weirder?" Quinn prompted, smiling faintly.

"You're really pretty," Rachel blurted.

"Oh. Thank you." Her brow furrowed. "Um. Do you want some tea?"

Quinn Fabray really was quite repressed, and cutely shy, in her own way, now that Rachel thought about it.

"I would love some tea."


End file.
